Summary For the multi‐sensor multi‐channel autoregressive (AR) moving average signals with white measurement noises and an AR‐colored measurement noise, a multi‐stage information fusion identification method is presented when model parameters and noise variances are partially unknown. The local estimators of model parameters and noise variances are obtained by the multidimensional recursive instrumental variable algorithm and correlation method, and the fused estimators are obtained by taking the average of the local estimators. They have the strong consistency. Substituting them into the optimal information fusion Kalman filter weighted by scalars, a self‐tuning fusion Kalman filter for multi‐channel AR moving average signals is presented. Applying the dynamic error system analysis method, it is proved that the proposed self‐tuning fusion Kalman filter converges to the optimal fusion Kalman filter in a realization, so that it has asymptotic optimality. A simulation example for a target tracking system with three sensors shows its effectiveness. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.